Where The Bow Tie Magic Happens...

You may have seen my Instagram post where I shared some imagery of my lovely garden studio  - the place where I am typing this right now and where I design, knit, package and wrap and photograph your lovely Bow Tie, Suspender, Skinny Tie, Bow Tie Pin and all the Wool & Whisker Cat and Dog Bow Tie orders.

The company that made my studio, Solilux, sent Herbert, a professional photographer from Dijkhuizen Visuals round the other week to photograph what the space had become. I had turned the little empty hut they craned over the top of our building last year into a multi purpose creative space. They kindly sent the photographs to me so I can share them with you. For this blogpost I took a few more of the storage details myself...and it is not as tidy as when Herbert came over!

I am fully aware that this is the creative entrepreneur dream, it was my unattainable wish for years and after a lot of saving, research and planning I still can't quite believe we made it a reality!

It was custom built in the Solilux factory after we chose the dimensions, flooring, exterior materials and door and window placement. 

While waiting for it to arrive, I spent hours drawing the floor plan and playing with how to repurpose the furniture I already had and how to get as much of my materials and resources in without losing precious space to actually work.

I got Pegboards from Ikea and a lot of their handy little attachments for my hardware, threads and swing labels. I also chose the bar attachments to put string and ribbon on along with hooks for the various tools I use such as jewellery clamps and my trusty single hole puncher for my tags. I chose the magazine rack attachements for my Custom design swatch boards and Wool & Whiskers Pawprint tissue paper which I wrap orders in.

My old Ikea dresser now holds all my cones of yarn in colour organised fashion (that's my story and I'm sticking to it) and I re-purposed the wooden crates I bought for Wedding Fair displays as bookcases and more yarn storage.

Before moving in I really considered how I had worked in the last space - a small and dark spare bedroom in our old apartment - I thought about my work flow and how I could get as much floor space as possible and light! When you are a small indie brand, your space really serves a vast multitude of purposes.

• General Admin / Accounts / Marketing and Customer Service
• Designing
• Making (in my case Knitting and Sewing)
• Packaging
• Photographing
• Storage for all materials required
• Studying - as a small business owner without formal education in marketing, graphic design, SEO, Google Analytics and a lot more I have a lot to continuously learn.

So here it is, this little room is my Bow Tie, Suspenders, Mini Bow Tie Lapel Pins and Necklaces, Skinny Tie and Pet Bow Tie factory. I knit and design in here, construct and finish the pieces, package and wrap them up ready for their new homes. I do my admin, teach my online knitting lessons. I also hosted my Insta LIVE Curious Conversations from here and use it to join my online knitting club nights with friends.

Some nights I sit in here knitting and watch the TV that my husband isn't into (Hollywoodland and yes I have many thoughts on it, another post maybe). Last night, I sat in here and read my current book (Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge - which I highly recommend by the way).

It is mere meters from our ground floor apartment, my daughter now knows to wave 'Bye' to me when I head for the back door, and as you can see it sits in our somewhat bare garden...Thanks to 'Rona our gardening plans took a backseat for more important bills and such like but I have acquired the odd cheeky floral treat from our local Lidl to give it a little flourish until we can source pots and planting soil. On my original @woolandwhiskers Instagram post, the lovely Rebecca from Beehive Design kindly shared some great suggestions so watch this soon to be green space!

Right now I am sitting with the doors open as I type this, listening to the chatter of my surrounding neighbours and the birds in the trees - it's pretty ace! I pinch myself regularly!

I hope you enjoyed my Wool & Water Garden Studio tour - is it how you imagined? 

To get exclusive previews and access to new, special edition Bow Tie, Suspender, Tie and all the Mini Bow Tie accessory designs, along with curiosity celebrating insights and treasures, sign up to my newsletter The Curio ...or if my Pet Bow Tie designs are more your thing you can find The Treat newsletter here.